It is spoken in New Jersey. (Whether that is sufficient to make it a living

language is a matter of opinion…)

Much more to the point, it is spoken in the MidEast, according to a report

in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (“Language of Jesus’ era nearly gone;

Scholars work for the survival of Aramaic,” 3/26/2005) sent to me by a

reader. From which:

“In the Middle East, Aramaic has been surpassed by Hebrew in what is

modern-day Israel and by Arabic and Farsi elsewhere. Experts guess there are

about 800,000 Aramaic speakers, with the number shrinking by the year.

“The surviving speakers are confined to tiny pockets in Iran and southern

Armenia, as well as here in Malula [a town in Syria] and two nearby

villages, Rezkallah said. Some scholars add hamlets in Turkey and Iraq to

that list.

“Even in an Aramaic stronghold such as Malula, the language is undermined in

the most conspicuous ways, said the Rev. Toufic Eid, the superior at

Malula’s Convent of St. Serge and St. Bacchus.

“Eid said construction of an Aramaic-language institute in Malula has

foundered, and not even the masses in Malula’s Greek Catholic and Greek

Orthodox churches are said in Aramaic.”